About the Author

Shaun Killian is an experienced teacher and principal with a passion for helping students to excel. He believes that assisting teachers to adopt evidence-based education is the best way to make this happen. Shaun is committed to bringing you practical advice based on solid research.

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If only effect sizes for diverse pieces of research could be compared in this way, we would have an extremely useful tool to improve education! As it is, it must be taken with a considerable grain of salt.

There is some debate about meta-analyses, and synthesising the results of more than one meta-analyses. Sometimes a careful reading of the underlying research is critical. The effect size of worked examples has gone down due to the inclusion of one new meta-analysis with a broader definition of worked examples. It showed the that worked examples were powerful when showing students steps in a process ( the traditional idea of worked examples), but not effective when used to introduce concepts (expanded definition). This led to an overall lowering of the summarised effect size.

I wanted to make readers aware of the list as it stands – exploring the research behind it will take more time, but it is indeed very necessary.

Help – anyone.
I appreciate the new list. Very helpful, as someone returning to the primary classroom after many Years in PE.
I am presently doing research on PE and the influence on spelling (strictly spelling) with 8 and 9 Year olds.
If anyone has or knows of any information/research in this area it would be super helpful.
Thanks.

Thank you for this update. I have been steeped for decades in teaching students metacognitive strategies and their imbibing the practices on their own. I am intrigued that metacognitive strategies leapt from .69 as listed in the Visible Learning for Literacy to .83 and .86. My experience has taught me the power for learning when students metacognize.

Hi Jason
John has personally given some to me, and others I have found through searching research databases. I haven’t got access to all of them, and I am still working through those I do have access to.
Regards
Shaun

A typical teacher working hard and trying new things has an effect of 0.4. The effect size over 2 years for NAPLAN cohorts (eg Yr 3 2015 to Year 5 2017) is also about 0.4 per year.

In general, this means that factors with an impact of more than 0.4 are the ones to focus on. However, time needed to implement something and the cost of doing so also come into play. If something takes little effort or money, then it is worth doing even the effect size is below 0.4

An effect size of 1.0 is huge. It is readily visible to those in the classroom. In another context (height) it is the difference between someone who is 160 cm tall and someone who is 183 cm tall.

Have I missed something? I am intrigued by the absence of literacy and numeracy in the list of effect sizes, apart from the “Technology in reading/literacy”. I’d be glad to be enlightened if I’m reading the list wrong or misunderstanding it.

Hi Michelle
I can’t give you an effect size, but research (http://bit.ly/2kRy0PC) shows it has a significant impact, with that impact being even larger in schools with high numbers of struggling students.
Cheers
Shaun

I find the comment regarding evidence citations interesting. Surely all claims made should have transparent access to the source of data used. It seems somewhat bizarre that you should have to ‘search’ research data bases to ‘find’ it.

I did find this list interesting. However, as a teacher of special needs children in the US, we need to not ignore the fact that deportation should be high on the list. Not only impacting children and families, but the community as a whole. I am hoping that Hattie’s most current research covers this, because it is a very large elephant that needs to be honored, thank you.